1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to systems for identification and estrus state detecting in cattle, and more particularly to an apparatus which is capable of detecting a cow in heat, transmitting the detected state by radio and providing an aural or visual indication of the detected state to the user so that he can identify the cow in heat.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Recently, livestock farmers have bred an increased number of cattle because they have accelerated the fecundity of the cattle while being specialized in stockbreeding. Generally, the livestock farmers have branded ranch's inherent identification (ID) numbers respectively on the hides of rumps of the cattle using a piece of heated iron or liquid nitrogen and identified the cattle according to the branded ranch's inherent ID numbers. However, such a method gives the cattle pain in the number branding procedure, resulting in a degradation in cattle welfare.
A different conventional cattle identification method is to attach rubber boards marked with individual ID numbers, respectively, to ears of cattle. It is easy to attach the rubber boards, however this method has a disadvantage in that they are liable to become soiled and the numbers in the boards thereof are liable to be erased, thereby making it very hard to accurately identify the cattle.
On the other hand, one conventional estrus state detection method is to observe an estrus state of cattle directly with the naked eye. In this method, the observation must be made at least twice a day with respect to the estrus state of the cattle to obtain an estrus observation ratio of 90% or more. However, this method is disadvantageous in that it is difficult to observe cattle with a short estrus duration.
Another conventional estrus state detection method is to detect an estrus state of a cow according to estrus-based mount permission of the cow. A tube filled with ink is mounted on a caudal part of the cow, and it is then burst to discharge the ink upon mount permission. As a result, the estrus state of the cow is detected with the ink discharged. However, this method has high dection accruacy, but it is unable to recognize an exact estrus start time.
Yet another conventional estrus state detection method is that a switch is mounted on a caudal part of a cow for the recording of an estrus state of the cow upon mount permission. However, in this method, ID codes are not assigned to cows proper identification methods are not provided , thereby making it hard to identify a certain one of the cows in heat.
Further, there is required a technique capable of performing both the above cattle identification and estrus state detection to reduce the amounts of time and labor power is required.